Most of this blog entry was written weeks ago. I just didn't know if I should post it so it just sat in draft form. If I responded, it would make everyone call me a bully again. I was also getting accusations that my intention for the original post was so I can benefit Nuffnang and thus myself. And of course, I got sidetracked with the Protection Order business.

As I have mentioned many times, the reason why I wrote my original post is because VINCENT HA CALLED ME A LIAR. I wanted to clear my own name.

NO, Nuffnang DID NOT orchestrate or ask me to write it. They do NOT interfere with my blogging content and never did. If you want to think that I have shady ulterior motives, there is nothing I can say to convince you otherwise because only I will know what my true intentions are. You can think what you want.

People seem to have this notion that exposing Gushcloud will only benefit Nuffnang and thus myself.

Wrong.

It adversely affects the whole industry, making clients simply not want to deal with bloggers anymore.

Most big brands don't wish to be embroiled in controversy whether good or bad.
I also had to mentally prepare myself that somehow, if my research went wrongly, I could go bankrupt for writing my expose. The monetary gains don't match up to the risk involved.

Nobody will risk everything if they didn't believe in a higher purpose.

I risked it all because I care, passionately, about this blog advertising industry that I'm a pioneer in. Even though it could adversely affect myself and my industry in the short term, I felt it was necessary to trim out bad practices before they actually become commonplace and cause long term damage.

How is it that as a journalist, you seem to have no idea, what "refute" means?

Here, I copy paste the dictionary.com definition for you:

Rufute: prove (a statement or theory) to be wrong or false; disprove.

WHICH PART OF MY BLOG POST DID THEY PROVE DEFINITIVELY WRONG?

None?

First,
their ST journalist Melissa Sim doesn't even check that Gushcloud's
reported earnings are correct before she prints it, then now this
bullshit.

If I don't respond, it seems as if I've
conceded defeat - wrote a post with evidence I gathered for a year, got
my points "refuted", then due to magnanimosity of my adversaries, was
let off the hook for a defamation lawsuit.

That's ain't happening.

I know this is a bit late. As I said, I wrote all these a long time ago and just didn't feel like publishing. Might as well do it now. If you don't wish to read Part 1, just skip to the juicier Part 2.

(Disclaimer:
The explanation emails were sent to me by Gushcloud clients so I cannot vouch for their authencity. Click links to read full version.)

I'll be addressing the more interesting points in some of the responses.

Let's start with the Malaysian email:

OK seriously WTF.
You think that somehow, I did one year of preparation work on my post
and only decided to post it because of your lame Christmas video? A
Christmas video that had no content except for your wooden influencers
dancing around and a few rap lyrics?? CHILDISH

Ok
seriously nobody gives a shit why you lost money. The topic at hand
here is whether you inflated your earnings. And who cares what you earned in 2013? Not relevant.

Btw nobody is surprised you will get an increased revenue in 2013 if you have been sending inflated outdated blogger stats for a year.

FROM VINCENT HA'S RESPONSE, HE BASICALLY ADMITTED THAT THEY DID INFLATE THEIR EARNINGS.

Summary:

Unknown employee (only Althea Lim was quoted in the article, was it her?) went to
report inflated earnings.

Is honest mistake, like dog eating homework.

When confronted by me about this in 2013, he couldn't remember such an article
ever was published even though it hung on his office wall.

He supposedly called his reporter friends to
check but didn't address this bit.

Did you forget to call Melissa Sim or
did she forget she once reported earnings?

Gushcloud
logic: Why would they inflate earnings when it will cause higher taxes?
Why inflate when truth will come out once earnings are filed with ACRA?

Erm
firstly taxes is based on profits, not revenue. You can say you have a
revenue of a billion but if your company also lost a billion there is no
need to pay taxes.

Secondly, pathological liars, not saying that
Gushcloud or Vincent or Althea is one, do not ever think their lies will be
exposed. If they do, they just use more lies to cover it. Probably
nobody expected me to go buy their financial reports or dig up an old article. It was only after I literally forced Vincent's hand with hard evidence that he finally admitted Gushcloud did report false earnings.

Anyway..
Siang is saying that they DO NOT inflate their earnings and Vincent is admitting they did.

Which one is it Gushcloud?

I've never mentioned that Gushcloud "forces" their influencers to mask ads, so I don't know why they keep harping on that.

I love the play on words here... You guys ask Eric "not to write it as an ad". I think even idiots know that sounds like an instruction for ad masking. But you want to argue that that sentence means not to read like a boring advertisement? Is there a need to emphasize such a dumb instruction twice? Any blogger will know that they shouldn't make their ads boring. Ok... whatever you say.

Moving on, Vincent then went on to say that masking ads isn't against the law and casually mentioned Nuffnang bloggers who were also caught masking ads.

Not against the law but is it ethical?

Here's a poll I did on facebook:

Seems like most people don't agree it's ethical...

What about what Yilin did? She didn't only mask her ad, she outrightly lied that she stumbled upon the client by herself.

Recap of Yilin's ad:

(She was instructed by Doug Chu to say she chanced upon the ad on Kaykay's blog)

Gushcloud mentions time and again that it is up to their influencers if they wish to do masked ads, the choice is theirs.

But at the end of the day let's not forget that Gushcloud takes a cut out of the money.

They should be held responsible for THEIR decision to accept an ad from clients that are not only masked, it is outright deceitful in the case of Doug Chu and Yilin Goh.

In a radio interview with 93.8FM, you can hear an audio performance of Althea's strong suit of playing with words. (Link)

Because even though Yilin has admitted that she absolutely did not chance upon Kaykay's banner by herself and doesn't even follow Kaykay, as long as she has seen the banner AFTER being instructed by Doug Chu that means it's the same as chancing upon it by herself...?

Proceeds to show that once upon a time Yan Kay Kay and Asyiha Ams did achieve relatively high pageviews so this it isn't consider inflation to use those numbers instead of current accurate ones.

Outdated pageviews

Gushcloud is great at playing with words. Outdated statistics sound so much better than inflated statistics.

One is neglect while the other is deceit. But just because it is outdated doesn't prove it isn't deliberately done so.

When you give old stats from a year or even 2 years ago that the blogger cannot reasonably hit today, that is giving outdated AND inflated stats.

Either way, whether neglect or deceit, Gushcloud has to take responsibility. It is the company's due diligence to check that the statistics they present are up-to-date and accurate.

If I book a model for a photoshoot and the modeling agency tells me the model is 50kg and sends me a gorgeous headshot, but on the actual day the model arrives and she is 150kg and 20 years older than the photo, is this ok? Then the agency argues that their deck is outdated, once upon a time the model did look like that and was 50kg. The shoot cannot go on and everyone's time is wasted. This is the same for bloggers isn't it? You waste the client's time and the campaign period is over by the time you find out the numbers presented were misleading.

Here is their influencer Chevonne Cheng's deck I got from 2 clients as well as Doug Chu:

Right...

If you can update twitter, instagram and facebook statistics and even change the photo to more current ones, WHY CAN'T YOU UPDATE YOUR GOOGLE ANALYTICS NUMBERS?

You are saying it is technologically challenging to supply clients with up-to-date blog page views? What's so hard about logging in to their Google Analytics account?! It just takes a few clicks!

What a weak excuse.

If my counter is inaccurate like Vincent Ha claims then why don't you show the pageviews that Kaykay, Eric and Asyiha had on the month I recorded? That is the easiest way to prove that your stats are not inflated and poke holes in my argument.

The only reason I can think of why you didn't do that, is because the actual numbers are still a far way from the numbers you sold to Doug Chu. Am I right?

While we are on the topic of gross inflation, how about explain this one?

These two decks are sent to two different clients at around the same time in 2014. How can it be that the views can differ so much? Did an unknown employee make an honest mistake again?

Can Gushcloud please show, via a video recording of Isabel Tan's Google Analytics (so we know you didn't doctor the screenshots), whether she has EVER hit 120,000 pageviews a month (4,000 a day) or anything close to that?

I have already mentioned in the previous post that I cannot prove this with irrefutable evidence. Why bother to argue until the cows come home?

I'd just like to explain WHY I found Babe of all Trades' viewership so suspicious. And no, it's not because I have a personal agenda.

These numbers are not meant to PROVE anything because they are not conclusive evidence in any way. But I just wish to show you guys why I had doubts about the authenticity of the channel.

1) Do you think it's possible that Babe of All Trades is more popular than Budget Barbie?

Because it is. Budget Barbie is a popular long-running show that is a household name. Over the years it has gathered many fans with 81 episodes over 4 years. That's how it achieved it's high viewership today. As for the other...

2) Budget Barbie Qiuqiu is my friend, so one might say I am biased. Fine. Now I ask, Is it possible Yan Kay Kay is more popular than herself? By that I mean herself in the show that made her popular, Chick vs Dick.

I averaged out the views for all Chick Vs Dick episodes that Yan Kay Kay are in. Click on the link to look at the average views per ep if you wish.

Chick vs dick gets a lot of views from loyal viewers of clicknetwork that's amassed over years. Babe of all Trades is a standalone channel that's so new. Did Kay Kay somehow eclipse herself in popularity?

3) If indeed she is so powerful and can gather so much support from her fans to watch her videos, may I ask why the views for your Gushcloud Xmas video is so low?

Almost two months (2/2/15) after publishing with most of your most popular influencers hyping the video, this is all the views the video got.

Why isn't Yan Kay Kay able to push views for this like how she pushed for her own Babe of all trades channel? She made 4 instagram posts about the Christmas video afterall.With statistics like this, can you really blame me for doubting the authenticity of the channel?

There are actually 182 posts under the #GCchristmasvid hashtag posted by enthusiastic Gushcloud influencers to hype the video. There is even a controversy afterwards to help add views. AND WHY STILL LIKE THAT??

Gushcloud influencers and staff alike then insinuate that this Christmas video is the reason for my expose.

Ehhhhhhhhh

I was involved in three Christmas videos for Clicknetwork. I exchanged roles with Qiuqiu and pretended to be Budget Barbie, and Qiu pretended to be me, interacting with Dash for Guide to Life. And finally a bloopers video.

Here are the stats for all the videos, published around the same time:

(Screenshots taken 2/2/2015)

Right... I am so jealous!

Both Siang and Vincent are downplaying Gushcloud's qualified opinion. Just ask any accountant or finance person and they will tell you it speaks volumes about a company.

HOW do you lose receipts and documentations for $233,444?? HOW?

This isn't just $100 or even $1,000 of lost receipts... It is hundreds of thousands of dollars!

Maybe Part 2 can shed some insight into this.

Now in 2012, Gushcloud had an interesting year. After receiving US$500,000 from Singhome fund, they expanded to several countries, including San Francisco.

On June 15, 2012, Gushcloud announced that they will be hosting a concert at the 4,000-capacity Fort Mason Center, San Francisco.

The concert will involve popular bands like The Cab, Mayday Parade and Hellogoodbye.

Looks like, even with their first ticket special (-20%, lowering age limit and adding after-party to all tickets), tickets weren’t selling. As of August 2nd, they were still promoting the concert and, tweeted a “secret code” for -15% off of VIP tickets. Guess that was their last hurrah, because 5 days later, The Cab (not GUSH -___-) let us know the event was cancelled.

In other words, possibly bad ticket sales?

The Cab confirms to their fans that the concert is cancelled.

Anyway, the reason why I'm bringing this up is because Gushcloud, when talking about their $984k loss for 2012, always says it's due to Facebook's change of policy:

This is parroted by Siang as well.

According to the article, the company was close to being shut down by October 2012. But unbeknownst to most people, the reason they were on the brink of bankruptcy was not just because Facebook decided to stop allowing users to earn money through their platform.

In my opinion, it is also due to a poor business decision to put in a huge chunk of investor money into a ridiculously large scale concert/party in USA that didn't work out.

To cancel a concert so last minute will cost a bomb. If you book a band, they have to prepare their act for you and also cannot be booked by anyone else on that day. The same goes for the prestigious Fort Mason concert venue.

Where's the concert expense?

Maybe some of the cost is in the $233k of lost receipts?

I guess unless Gushcloud explains more about this mysterious concert cancellation, we will never know.

Now 2012 gets more interesting.

From the leaked whatsapp chat, two screenshots were posted:

Shaun's FB posts on the day of the 1st expose

Here's the background story:

Shaun (I did not know him before the saga) knows a guy who was an intern with Gushcloud back in 2012. This guy, named Sheng Yu, told Shaun that he was allegedly forced to falsify documents for Gushcloud during his stint with them.

(Disclaimer: I cannot verify the veracity of this guy's allegations. The screenshots are reposted from here.)

After I wrote my exposé, Shaun posted the above on his facebook. Althea called him and told him to take them down, so he did.

When the Gushcloud whatsapp group chat leaked, Shaun saw that Althea told the influencers that Shaun only posted those facebook posts because she didn't want to hire him. This made him angry.

He called Althea to confront her.He then recorded the conversation and posted it on his soundcloud and sent me the link.

I took the liberty of editing it and adding subtitles.

YOU HAVE TO CLICK AND PLAY THIS. IT IS A VOICE RECORDING WHICH SHOWS GUSHCLOUD CO-FOUNDER ALTHEA LIM'S TRUE OPINIONS ON ADVERTISING ETHICS.

In it, Althea Lim states her views on inflating numbers and sheds some light on the mystery of the NUS intern who worked for Gushcloud.

She states that if she has 170k (Gush Ad?) users and she will tell advertisers she has 200k users. Or that if she has 1000 users, she will say she is "growing to" 10,000 users. She then adds that "every Marketeer in the valley does it".

The day Gushcloud hit 10,000 users... Or is it 1,000?

The cavalier attitude towards misleading numbers for advertisers are also reflected in the inflated blogger page views and earnings we witnessed.

After hearing this, what do you think? Are the misleading numbers I present in the first post an oversight, an honest mistake, or a figment of my imagination because of a grudge against Kay Kay? Or is it the deliberate actions of someone who finds absolutely nothing wrong with exaggerating statistics? You decide.

My favourite statement for all:

Makes me wonder how "clean" the other businesses are...

And Althea... Did you ask Sheng Yu to falsify anything for you and what is it actually? I'm dying of curiosity here.

After verifying with people who work with them, I confirmed that this is a real brief of Gushcloud's.

What is a brief? A brief is given to bloggers before they write their ads... Like the brief that Doug Chu gave to Yilin, the contents will include the unique selling points of the product, the urls to link and the hashtags to include.

It's the bare bones of the post - then bloggers are supposed to add in their own opinions and take pictures etc to flesh out the entry and make it their own.

This appears to be a brief Gushcloud gave to their influencers for the Singtel Youth Plan campaign. More than 10 of their influencers actually wrote blog adverts for this campaign.

I couldn't believe what I was reading.THE INFLUENCERS ARE OPENLY ASKED, IN BLACK AND WHITE, TO "COMPLAIN" ABOUT THE CLIENT'S COMPETITORS.

In
my 12 years of blogging, I have NEVER seen a brief that asks me to complain about a competitor's service/product. Not from Nuffnang, not from clients direct. So please DO NOT
assume that this is the norm, because it ISN'T.

11.1 Advertisements should not unfairly attack or discredit other products,
organisations or professions directly or by implication.

Although the brief is for a Singtel ad campaign, I do not know if Singtel is aware of the brief or created the brief.

Maybe it was their ad agency/media planners who handled it and they just paid money. It could have been Gushcloud who created the campaign, or it could be the agency in charge of their marketing. I find it hard to believe Singtel would write that incredibly juvenile proposed story board. I guess they will clarify after this.

All we do know is that Gushcloud ok-ed the brief and delegated it to their influencers. The brief may ask for the influencers to lambast M1 and Starhub, but it doesn't mean the bloggers have to do it.

But, just as directed, their some of their influencers rose spectacularly to the challenge to begin their smear campaign on M1 and Starhub.

But first, how to make their complains about M1 and Starhub seem legit?

Some of the bloggers decide to first talk shit about M1 and Starhub on Twitter to lay a realistic foundation for their upcoming blog post.

They are very hardworking! The campaign date was supposed to be June 28th 2014 but some of them started their tweet-attacks even a few days before.

One thing to note before I post their tweets.

You may have noticed that the campaign is commission-based. The influencers get an LG G3 phone, but otherwise monetary payment is based on how many sign ups they get. Less than 5, nothing. Hit 31 sign ups, $4,000 + Singtel pays your phone bill for a year.

Hence, a lot of the influencers themselves signed up for the Youth Plan. Maybe it's because the plan is genuinely good. But maybe it's also because if they sign up, it adds 1 to their own sales count.

LOL wonder if she really frustrated by an actual phenomenon or just giggling

to herself at a fake tweet that's meant to supplement her blog advert later.

Look how sweet Lydia is to her clients!

Not even one month ago she just did 3 ads for Starhub (link, link, link).

GOOD JOB! Your mother must be very proud of you. :D

#Gushcloudethics

Gushcloud influencer Eunice Annabel:

It's tough to choose one because they are all so gross, but this tweet is my favourite:

LMAO because Starhub trying to court her over with ice cream when she's aiming for $4,000 from Singtel... Try harder lah Starhub lol!!!

Now, her tweet... She claims it's not an ad.

There is no two ways around it. Eunice Annabel got a free phone as payment, perhaps more, depending on the sign ups she garnered. Since the tweet is obviously within the campaign period and aiding the campaign, IT IS PART OF AN AD.

Secondly, the most hilarious thing is this:She did NOT switch to the Singtel Youth Plan.

6 days prior to tweeting this, Eunice Annabel already blogged her advert, and in it, she clearly states only students and NS men are eligible for the plan. She is neither, so she knows she cannot sign up for this plan.

Yet she still decides to tweet a lie.

In November, with another advert for Singtel again, she confirms that she didn't take on the Youth Plan.

Since this short tweet contains a double whammy of lies, I pick it as my favourite. You win my vomit Celebrity Blogger!

And here are some of the blog posts from the Gushcloud influencers:

I have picked out the quotes of them trash talking about M1 and Starhub because the posts are too long. You can click links below to view the full posts.

Gushcloud and its influencers have used "it's a true opinion" as their defense before and therefore I assume that it's also going to be their excuse this time round.

Just because it's a "true opinion" it means you don't have to clarify it's an ad? How do you prove it's a true opinion?

If you are paid by a client to pretend it's your true opinion, OF COURSE you say that's your true opinion right? #duh

Every one of us have complained about our telcos before. They provide our internet and phone lines for us, without which most of us cannot live without (metaphorically). When service isn't available, naturally we all rile up.

Even if the influencer has a track record of complaining about their telcos and it's a proven "true opinion" that they hate their telco, this time round they are being PAID (in money or products) to do so.

THIS MAKES ALL THE DIFFERENCE IN THE WORLD. You are being PAID. You have incentive and there is a conflict of interest. The consumer deserves to know.

This time round, when they tweet that M1 sucks, maybe M1 didn't give substandard service at all. Did poor M1 or Starhub truly deserve this round of attacks? Or is it really a true opinion that's so coincidentally also a paid one?

So from now on magazines and newspapers and TV all don't have to specify ads yeah? Because they can all claim it's the publication's/station's true opinion? So convenient!

It's not breaking the law, so what's the problem? No problem. You just decide for yourself if you can trust the blogger's "true opinions" in future, that's all.

Just like how it's Eunice Annabel's true opinion that her sponsored LG G3 phone from this Singtel campaign is so much better than her iphone.

As you can see, all of these blogs are CLEARLY stated as advertorials and there is no slandering competitors or conjuring fake-as-my-nose tweets. I bring this up not to claim Nuffnang is better (which, imho, it is), but to show that bloggers CAN deliver advertorials in an ethical manner. This is the way it should be done.

Some of the Gushcloud influencers, even though they have been instructed to complain about M1 and Starhub, did not do so. Kudos to them.

Ok this is just for laughs because the post is getting way too long. A little dessert!

So remember in the last exposé I talked about how Gushcloud got sponsors for their office renovation? One of the sponsors sent me the deck Gushcloud sent to them and it's fucking hilarious!! I laughed nonstop so I thought I'd share it with you guys.

Click to view full deck HERE. Name of sponsor is changed to XXX Renovation to protect their identity but nothing else is changed. The full deck is damn funny if you very free should read it. :D

OMGee!! The GC Team and clients MAY touch XXX renovation's kitchen cabinet!! Touch one time worth thousands because they are King Midas, touch already turn into gold!! The celebrity bloggers MAY post about the granite sink because bloggers have nothing better to post than to post about sinks and kitchen appliances!! Worth thousands!! And you invited to our parties! BAM IT'S ALL WORTH $25,000 PER YEAR!

No, this amount isn't pulled out from our asses!! What do you mean from where does that number come from? From our careful research lah!

IF some youtuber shoots in the Gushcloud kitchen, never mind that he has absolutely no obligation to mention XXX renovation, it's WORTH THOUSANDS to be obscurely in the background!! WOW!!! $20,000 annually for these shoots that may or may not happen!

Gushcloud puts your company logo on their websites and social media! Whoopie worth $20,000!!

People who come for meetings may try out the products themselves!!

Because clients confirm will use the induction cooker right or not?? What do you mean client don't typically feel like cooking during meetings?? NONSENSE. Suddenly this is worth $30,000 annually!!!

PEOPLE WHO WALK PAST THE KITCHEN TO TAKE A SHIT MAKE IT WORTH $30,000 ANNUALLY!! WOW WOW WOW!!

Don't forget you will get featured in Singapore's Most Cheapskate Inspiring Office!! Never mind that these publications have no obligation whatsoever to plug your company nor is it a sure thing that they will cover this press release... It's worth $30,000!!!

OMG GRAB LAH WHAT YOU WAITING FOR?!?

Ok this is serious, they actually put this cheesy yellow explosion graphic in themselves. I swear it's not added by me.

But yeah, 600% media benefit!! GO GUSHCLOUD!!!!

Why do I have to write this post? Do I really need to write a second exposé? Why don't I just let this issue go already and give Gushcloud a chance?

A chance was given back in 2013, after my dayre post. Got called a liar, and Gushcloud continued in its ways.

After the first exposé, got called a liar again.

Furthermore, Gushcloud appears to be completely unrepentant.

In the face of irrefutable evidence, they can still claim their conscience is clear.

Pray tell, why must I give a chance to them?

They then tried to divert the blame to me, calling me a bully, accusing me of starting a smear campaign against them to benefit myself monetarily or because I bear petty grudges against ex friends.

This isn't about me.

This isn't about Nuffnang.

This is about Gushcloud and its questionable ethics.

If Student X reports Student G for cheating on an exam, all that Student G can defend is that Student X is jealous of Student G being the top student? #FUCKOFF

Good try with the distraction tactics. Just answer for your actions. My motives have NOTHING to do with the accuracy of my accusations, which are backed with evidence time and again.

With this second exposé, you have heard for yourself Althea's admission coming from her own mouth.

You have witnessed their sales tactics and the (600%!) stats they show to clients.

You have witnessed the questionable things they tell their bloggers to write and how their bloggers obliged with fervour.

When questioned about ethics, they claim what they do isn't illegal.

After I found all the tweets and posts these Gushcloud influencers wrote, I literally felt a bit nauseous. I found it so unbelievable that the whole bunch of them can be so mercenary and immoral. They are good friends with each other too. When they witness each other's fakery on twitter, do they not feel disgusted by each other?!

You may have noticed these influencers are also among the loudest and most loyal supporters of Gushcloud after the first saga.

After I posted, I expected most of the influencers under Gushcloud to distance themselves. Some influencers did and kept quiet. But this bunch were unabashedly announcing their #FaithinGushcloud.

Now, I understand why. Their moral ethics are aligned. Of course they didn't feel Gushcloud did anything wrong.

I used to feel sorry for their influencers. I thought many felt trapped, coerced. I tried to offer help. But now I realised that I was wrong. Some of them don't deserve sympathy. They deserve the public to know their true nature.

This is just ONE brief that's exposed.

Goodness know how many other briefs could be similar.

Goodness knows how many briefs will be exactly like that after today if I didn't blog about it. How many innocent client's competitors slandered by their bloggers.

Sorry I'm not sorry. I do not find what they do ok. I do not appreciate being called a liar or have my motives questioned.

I will continue posting what I think is right. Right for my industry, right for the reputation of bloggers and right for the readers who still believe in bloggers.

Despite what people say about me. Call me a bully. Call me an evil mastermind. I don't care.

As long as you share the post after insulting me so people know what's going on.